Interactive voice response (IVR) systems have been widely used by many organizations to provide computerized customer support services, such as account access and technical support for products and services (e.g., retail, financial, administrative, etc.). When a support center with an IVR system is contacted by a caller, the caller is typically presented with voice information. The IVR system poses voice queries to the caller, typically in a menu-driven fashion. Then, the caller inputs responses via a touch-tone (e.g., dual-tone multifrequency (DTMF)) telephone to the voice queries from the IVR system. In most cases, the caller is then presented with additional voice queries based on the responses received.
As alluded to above, the IVR system typically presents a caller with voice queries based on some standard hierarchical dialogue menu (e.g., a decision tree). General queries are presented first at the top level, and then, based on the caller's responses, more specific queries are presented at lower levels to narrow the caller's requests. At the lowest level in the IVR system menu, namely the “leaf” level in a decision tree, the caller is finally presented with the most specific voice information available. It is this more specific information that the caller must navigate through sequentially and which the caller is usually most interested in.
Thus, there are several problems with such a standard menu presentation for an IVR system. Firstly, every caller typically must listen to the same standard menu and place a different sequence of phone keys on the telephone set to navigate the IVR system. These static-type menu-based approaches are very time-consuming. Such menu-driven systems are normally too general for a specific caller to obtain his/her desired information (and certainly not in a timely manner).
Moreover, in some cases such as using portable cellular telephones, the caller must actuate many telephone keys to indicate his desires and confirm the same. Such small portable phones typically must be lifted from the user's ear and then must depress the telephone key(s) and so forth to move through each of the options presented by the menu. This is highly inconvenient.
Secondly, with the ever more complex services being provided via an IVR system, it is becoming more difficult to successfully navigate an IVR system menu. Usually, it is only after a long sequence of pushing the buttons that the caller finally obtains the desired information or services. If mistakes were made during the button-pushing process, a caller normally is lost. This represents a major inconvenience to the user, and potentially a lost opportunity (customer) to the retailer, etc. Sometimes the user does not even know how to go back to the main menu. It is not uncommon for a caller to make many phone calls to get to the desired information or obtain the needed services. Consequently, the frustrated caller becomes an unhappy customer.
Thirdly, even if a caller is successful in navigating the complex menu, it is still inconvenient to go through the same long sequence again and again every time the caller accesses the same information. For example, a caller calls an 800 number to check the caller's bank account for a certain deposit check. The caller may have to make many calls during a period of several days. This caller must listen and go through the same menu(s) having a long sequence of buttons and commands repeatedly.
In one conventional system, a system and method are disclosed for graphically displaying and navigating through an interactive voice response menu. The emphasis is on displaying the IVR menu graphically on a computer screen to let a caller navigate the menu graphically. However, such a system does not present a personalized menu for a caller.
Furthermore, such a system does not keep track of caller's access patterns, nor does the system present another set of personalized menus for a caller based on the caller's prior access patterns.